If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

The Ministry and Muggle-borns during DH.

Was it ever made explicit what happened to Muggle-borns during Voldemort's brief moment of control over the Ministry of Magic? I had a quick look over the chapters where the Trio break in to the Ministry, and while someone gets threatened with a stay in Azkaban and someone else is told they'll get Kissed if they resist questioning, there's nothing much I could find about what exactly happens. There's a few students that we're told went into hiding - what about the ones that got caught?

Would it be possible for a Muggle-born student, with no real connection to the wizarding world when they're outside of it, to show up to Platform 9 3/4 or even Hogwarts itself, just to be quietly led away and taken off to wherever the Muggle-borns were kept once they were caught? Would it be further believable, then, assuming Muggle-borns were sent to Azkaban and that there's some kind of similar avoidance of putting underage people in for-reals jail in wizard culture, that the young witches and wizards Harry sees writing out the anti-Muggle propaganda pamplets for Umbridge might have been Muggle-born students put to work doing something menial and demoralising?

Was it ever made explicit what happened to Muggle-borns during Voldemort's brief moment of control over the Ministry of Magic? I had a quick look over the chapters where the Trio break in to the Ministry, and while someone gets threatened with a stay in Azkaban and someone else is told they'll get Kissed if they resist questioning, there's nothing much I could find about what exactly happens. There's a few students that we're told went into hiding - what about the ones that got caught?

Would it be possible for a Muggle-born student, with no real connection to the wizarding world when they're outside of it, to show up to Platform 9 3/4 or even Hogwarts itself, just to be quietly led away and taken off to wherever the Muggle-borns were kept once they were caught? Would it be further believable, then, assuming Muggle-borns were sent to Azkaban and that there's some kind of similar avoidance of putting underage people in for-reals jail in wizard culture, that the young witches and wizards Harry sees writing out the anti-Muggle propaganda pamplets for Umbridge might have been Muggle-born students put to work doing something menial and demoralising?

We don't know if Muggle-borns were sent to Azkaban, but we do know that at the very least they were registered and had their wands taken away from them. Also, Diagon Alley had wandless vagrants who approached Hermione disguised as Bellatrix in the Gringotts break-in chapter, so that seems to imply that the Voldemort puppet government stripped Muggle-borns of their wands and all their rights, but didn't bother sending all of them off to Azkaban - that would probably be expensive.

Overall, I'm getting the impression that Muggle-borns were essentially told to go 'back to the Muggle world where they belonged', but of course, most couldn't stomach life outside of the wizarding world and either lived as homeless beggars or were constantly on the run.

So what would the DH ministry to with a captured Muggle-born student? Well, they'd probably take his/her wand, interrogate him/her thoroughly about who the student supposedly stole the wand from, and then boot them out of the wizarding world to fend for themselves or lock them up in a detention centre of some sort.

I agree. Young children might be interigated by Umbridge, like we saw in the books, and I doubt she would show any more mercy to eleven-year-olds than she would to adults.

But I don't think young children would be detained, but just sent back to their parents. They would be sad to hear that they were not able to become wizards after all, but I think it would end up being much worse for the adults who had made lives for themselves in the wizarding world and probably had no ties left in the wizarding world. Remmber, like Tim said, there were a great deal of wandless vagrents in Diagon Alley. These were probably the Muggle-born adults who had nowhere to go in the Muggle world.

Does anyone think that Muggle-borns would be detained, or that they would just be sent back to the Muggle world.

Does anyone think that Muggle-borns would be detained, or that they would just be sent back to the Muggle world.

I think it would go on a case-by-case basis. Stubborn or troublesome Muggle-borns might be considered a big enough threat that they could "steal back" a wand if they had the chance, and would be imprisoned. However, for the average Muggle-born, they'd probably just be exiled to live as Muggles - that's a lot simpler and cheaper than keeping them in Azkaban.

I'm not sure any children who had yet to be enrolled in Hogwarts would be consider troublesome enough to bother with, though. I think instead of being led away or detained, they would just send one of the teachers back to their house and say there had been a mistake and they are not really wizards after all.

It depends on how nasty you want to make the Death Eaters. Rowling toned it down a lot, so we didn't really see the sort of atrocities that you'd think Voldemort's regime would commit, once they're in power. Wandless wizards on the streets and implied murder and torture on an individual level, yes, but no genocides, no hunting down Muggle-borns, no Death Eaters tormenting Muggles and Muggle-borns for sport, now that they could do so with impunity.

If you really want to go there, I do not think it's unlikely that the Death Eaters might have taken it upon themselves to start exterminating Mudbloods. Muggle-born children showing up at Kings Cross might have been quietly herded into a separate car and never seen again... and their parents followed home and either killed or Obliviated for good measure.

This is, of course, very dark, but I think it's what you'd have seen if Rowling was writing adult fantasy and not for children. It also gives the Order a lot more to do.

Plot Bunny: Why were Ginny and Neville trying to steal the Sword of Gryffindor from Snape's Office in DH?

They weren't. That was just what they claimed, when they were caught. They were actually trying to steal the quill that writes down the names of all incoming Hogwarts students, so that they could keep the Death Eaters from sending out letters and luring Muggle-born children to their deaths.

Plot Bunny: Why were Ginny and Neville trying to steal the Sword of Gryffindor from Snape's Office in DH?

They weren't. That was just what they claimed, when they were caught. They were actually trying to steal the quill that writes down the names of all incoming Hogwarts students, so that they could keep the Death Eaters from sending out letters and luring Muggle-born children to their deaths.

“She and a couple of friends got into Snape’s oﬃce and smashed
open the glass case where he was apparently keeping the sword.
Snape caught them as they were trying to smuggle it down the
staircase.”

So I doubt that they were trying to steal the quill –*why take a sword when you actually want a quill...

Other than that, I agree with Inverarity in general. It all depends on how high you want the rating of your story to go –*there's a general direction in canon, but no proof for how far the Ministry went.

This completely gorgeous banner, which makes me happier than a squirrel, was made by Hokey

That's a good point about the homeless in Diagon Alley - I'd forgotten about that detail. I was always under the impression that maybe Voldemort might have had long-term plans involving some kind of Muggle-born Final Solution, given how obvious the parallels are to certain real-life figures. I think I've got a handle on how wide the scope extends on this unfilled bit of the universe; thanks for your help.